4 Steps to a Collaborative Sales Team That Wins Consistently

Can a team be both competitive and collaborative at the same time?

Looking at the most successful sales teams, the answer is clearly yes. The best sales teams encourage both competition and collaboration.

They key to a sales team that has both qualities is to truly build a team, and not just a group of high performing sales reps. Build a cohesive team, and your reps will achieve more than they ever could individually.

Here are 4 steps to help you get started.

Embrace the Team Concept

You want people who perform well individually, of course, but assembling a successful team is about more than putting together a group of talented individuals.

In football, if you’ve got a big, slow quarterback with a rocket arm, you need talented blockers to protect him and skilled receivers to catch passes. Without that complementary talent, you won’t get the value you should out of your quarterback’s excellent arm.

Maybe sports aren’t your thing. That’s fine, too.

A skilled executive knows how to delegate tasks, and hire team members who can handle the load together.

The key is to hire talented people whose skills complement one another.

You already have a sales process in place, which is half the battle. Define your ideal team based on the talent you need to execute and scale your process, then fill in the pieces from there.

Celebrate Your Wins and Learn from Them

Closing deals is a challenge. It’s one of the reasons competitive people tend to fit well on sales teams, and it’s also what makes chalking up a win so rewarding.

So when you win a deal, celebrate. Ring a gong, throw confetti! Okay… maybe not confetti, but you can’t go wrong with a gong.

Creating rituals to celebrate your wins allows you to recognize the reps who contributed, motivate the rest, and build cohesion in your team.

But don’t stop at celebrating.

Every win is also an opportunity to learn and grow.

What was the key to winning the deal? Who contributed, and how? What lessons from this win can you apply to close more deals in the future?

There’s no easier time to get people talking than when you’re reviewing a won deal.

You Can Never Have Too Much Coaching

Over-invest in coaching.

Seriously. If you want a winning sales team, you need to give your reps the tools to succeed. Training new reps is vital, but the best reps are always looking to learn and grow, no matter how much success they’ve already experienced.

Your coaching should reflect your sales process, and your big-picture values. In the end, coaching is the best way to consistently develop high-performing sales reps.

Use technology to your advantage.

Review recorded sales calls with your reps. Identify the areas where they succeed, and guide them in the areas they need to improve.

Develop a system for identifying poorly performing reps, and put your coaching skills to work in improving their performance.

Coaching isn’t a punishment. It’s an opportunity. A poorly performing rep who recognizes that fact has already taken a big step toward turning things around.

Encourage Collaboration and Communication

This goes back to our first point about building a team instead of a group of individuals. Collaboration and communication are the lifeblood of the team dynamic.

Make it easy for team members to help one another, and encourage them to do so. Every deal is different, and every rep brings their own strengths to the table.

Your reps can help one another immensely, but the lines of communication have to be open.

Creating or amending your sales playbook is another great opportunity to encourage collaboration. Tapping into the knowledge of your reps allows you to build the best possible playbook, so it’s a win-win.

Take day-to-day feedback from your reps, too, and act on it. Your high-performers are perfectly positioned to help you improve your process, and acting on their best ideas validates their hard work.

Every team member has a role to play, and it’s your job to find the right people for the right roles. Your coaching helps reps grow, and your focus on collaboration keeps everyone working toward a common goal.

And who doesn’t like celebrating wins as a group? Nobody said teamwork had to be boring, after all.